2017 Supernatural creatures are granted Restricted Citizen status and become officially recognised in the eyes of the law.

2020 The Deus15 Incident occurred in an undisclosed location in South America, forming what what later is referred to as a Hellgate. The area is contained and neutralised, and all reports are buried.

2021 Hellgates appear in West Bengal, India; Louisiana, USA and Siberia, Russia. The areas are contained and neutralised, and all reports are buried. Project Safe Haven is approved by the UN.

2022 Hellgates appear in Nantes, France; Milan, Italy; Sydney, Australia and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The areas are contained and neutralised, but footage of the Sydney Hellgate is leaked to the press and internet. A worldwide panic ensues, with millions leaving their countries for supposedly safer nations. Project Safe Haven begins construction.

2029 Project Safe Haven is completed. 3.4 billion people come from all over the world take refuge in the megacity now known as Zion.

2031 As more Hellgates open up worldwide, Zion seals itself and is declared to be under martial law. The Watch system is established alongside the civic police.

2097 Earth has been completely overrun, the ground itself tainted by the uncontained Hellgates. Zion remains the only safe bastion.

----

Blurb:
For centuries, it was predicted that the apocalypse would occur in 2020. Just as often as a seer came out with this prediction, it was ignored. People, as a general rule, did not want to believe in such things, any more than they wanted to believe that supernatural creatures such as vampires, shapeshifters and witches lived alongside them. So the predictions were filed away and not much notice was taken of them, especially when other less gifted seers predicted the end of the world coming at the sixth day of the sixth month 2006. The vast majority of the general population heaved a sigh of relief when that day passed and the world carried on turning. The main result of this occurrance was sadly, that they would take even less notice of the 2020 prediction. At least, til the day it came to pass.

Before that, though, came a revelation. In 2016, it was discovered that supernatural creatures had been living among humans for thousands of years. It was a shock to most humans, especially when they discovered such things as the fact that their partner or friend who they'd known for years was a werewolf or perhaps a spell caster. There was much controversial discussion about whether or not to grant the supernatural creatures equal status with humans but by 2017 it had all been sorted out. Once again, the general population relaxed. Most people had already forgotten about the prediction of the apocalypse for 2020, and therefore did not think of it at all.

It began at first with just a small incident in South America. The authorities flung a veil of secrecy over the whole event, bribing those who were at the scene of the incident to stay quiet and banning all media from the area. At the time, it was fairly easy to hide what had happened from the world, but this was entirely the wrong thing to do. For what had occurred was the opening of a Hellgate; a door to the demon world, and thru which demons could enter the world and change it from the world everyone knew to a nightmare land.

This would have been bad enough had it been the only Hellgate, but in the following years several more opened up world wide. The authorities struggled to keep each one a secret from the world at large, even tho it was largely a hopeless case. The land around each Hellgate was declared a zone of alienation, like what had happened in the past around nuclear accident areas like Chernobyl, and sealed off. However, it was bound to happen sooner or later; a man, dissatisfied with what was going on practically in his own backyard and with the pay out that had been given him to keep quiet was to leak news of a Hellgate located in Austrailia to the press.

It went viral in minutes, appearing on almost every website and video site, causing a mass panic. With the response of denials and silence from the authorities, the panic got worse and worse. Eventually the only solution as it seemed was to build a safe city where humans could live away from the demons who had infiltrated the world.

That was then. This is now.

Coming to the end of the century, the only place that people can live in safety from the demons is Zion, which was created by Project Safe Haven. The city is immense and is completely self supporting, with plenty of room for the millions who flocked there seeking sanctuary. It is dangerous to venture outside for any reason as the demons now rule the world, and the land is tainted; any normal human would not survive long, even considering the fact that if they went outside, they would be destroyed by the demons almost at once. Those inside the city are protected by the police and the new Watch System.

The demons of course form groups, but theirs are not named and are constantly shifting in size and in leadership. Demons wish to destroy humankind, but also to possess the supernatural creatures if they can. There is danger out there waiting... the only question is, where will it strike?

"Without heroes we are all plain people and don't know how far we can go."